In animal husbandry settings, for example equine boarding facilities, breeding facilities, zoos and dairy farms, the health of animals is typically monitored by the staff of the facility and/or the owners of the animals. Such monitoring typically involves periodically visually inspecting the animals to identify any outward signs of potentially disabling conditions or other events of interest. As will be appreciated, many potentially disabling or fatal conditions are treatable and early detection may reduce the impact of the condition on a particular animal and/or prevent/reduce the spread of a contagious condition to other animals. Such events of interest may include, without limitation, equine colic, foaling, injury and lameness. It will be appreciated that many other examples are possible.
In equine settings, one potentially fatal condition of particular interest is colic. The term “colic” is applied to a variety of conditions of the digestive tract of which pain is the chief symptom. Various malfunctions, displacements, twistings, swellings, infections, or lesions of this complex body system are recognized as colic. The most common types of colic include, without limitation, intestinal impaction, colon impaction, intestinal obstruction, colon obstruction, intestinal strangulation, displacement, volvulus, spasmodic, gas, ileus, enteritis/colitis, and gastric distention/rupture. Less common types of colic include intestinal and colon parasitic colics, gastric ulcers, and intestinal stasis.
The causes of the various different types of colics are often unknown and may be linked to factors including the confinement of grazing animals for substantial periods of time each day. Colic is one of the oldest known disorders of horses, and has long been considered to be the most dangerous and the most costly equine internal disease. In this regard, colic is believed to be the leading cause of preventable death in horses and is generally considered to be responsible for about 17.5% of all equine deaths. Colic can kill a horse in a matter of hours and thus early detection is paramount. Detected in time, colic can usually be treated successfully using, for example, various non-invasive treatments, (e.g., drug treatments) as well as invasive (e.g., surgical) techniques. While this discussion has focused on colic for purposes of illustration, it will be appreciated that it may be desired to monitor performance, working, show or other horses for a variety of injuries and other medical conditions, to accumulate medical data, or to detect a variety of non-medical events of interest such as escapes from containment, environmental exposures and the like.
In dairy settings, one particular concern is lameness. That is, foot and leg problems are major animal health concern for many dairy farmers. Typically lameness results in poor performance and can result in substantial economic loss. For instance, when a dairy cow begins to favor a particular leg/foot, it may be an indication that the cow's hooves need to be trimmed to prevent worsening of the condition. Left untreated, initial lameness may result in one or more conditions that may require antibiotic treatment. For instance, an inflammation within the hoof may develop into a condition of laminitis, which may further cause mastitis. Economically, the result of lameness is typically much greater than the treatment costs alone. In this regard, it will be appreciated that treatment may reduce milk yields, require milk to be discarded during antibiotic treatment, and of course require additional labor costs. Accordingly, it is desirable to identify lameness early such that corrective measures may be taken before antibiotic treatment is required. Again, dairy cows may be monitored for many other reasons. Also, it will be appreciated that it may be desired to monitor a variety of animals in a variety of settings.
As noted above, in animal husbandry settings, monitoring the health of animals typically involves visually inspecting the animals to identify any outward signs of potentially disabling conditions or other events of interest. However, in many cases animals are only monitored during routine care (e.g., feeding) of the animals and, perhaps, at the end of the day. In such instances, many animals may be present at a single time and careful monitoring of individual animals may be difficult. Furthermore, such monitoring may be performed by inexperienced and/or poorly trained individuals. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, many animals in animal husbandry settings are left unmonitored for long periods of time (e.g., overnight) during which the onset of a condition of interest may occur. In particular, most colic deaths occur at night. As a result, conditions of interest may be identified too late to save the animal or only after the condition has worsened or treatment options have narrowed.
Some systems have been proposed or implemented for monitoring animals. For example, certain stall based or other external sensor systems have been proposed or implemented to detect conditions such as foaling based on sensing certain behaviors. Other systems attempt to provide a foaling alert based on sensing the expulsion of a foal or water. Still other sensing systems have been used in experimental or training environments to monitor an animal's gait. Additionally, a variety of sensors have been used in clinical and experimental settings to monitor various medical parameters to detect conditions of interest.
However, such systems are generally subject to one or more of the following limitations: 1) they are limited to monitoring an animal in a particular location, e.g., in a stall or otherwise in proximity to a sensor; 2) they are limited to monitoring a specific parameter or medical condition; 3) they are intended for brief experimental or periodic monitoring use and thus have limited potential for identifying sudden onset conditions; 4) they are intended for supervised or attended operation; 5) they entail a significant risk of entanglement or animal injury; 6) they are not conveniently transportable as may be desired; and/or 7) they are not intended as mass market systems or are otherwise cost prohibitive. It will be appreciated that medical and other conditions may be better monitored and greater animal information may be collected and aggregated by using a system that can be widely deployed by owners or others, that can be safely utilized in a variety of locations and environments, including overnight or longer term environments, to provide a variety of information for analysis, and that can make information available for remote analysis and aggregation.